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Health & Fitness

Do you know someone who might suffer from this disorder?

Do you know someone who might suffer from this disorder? There’s not much in the literature about it but anecdotally I can tell you there are many sufferers out there. Most of whom are women. And I was one of them.
Post-Traumatic Scale Disorder is an anxiety disorder that may develop after exposure to stepping on the scale and actually seeing how much you weigh.
Symptoms associated with this disorder can be the following:
• Having dreams that you are the Pillsbury Dough Boy/Girl float at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade
• Having a lot of physical sensations when reminded that you have your annual physical exam tomorrow and will have to be weighed and measured (heart pounds or misses a beat, sweating, difficulty breathing, feeling faint, feeling a loss of control)
Symptoms related to avoidance of this problem:
• Avoiding mirrors at any cost
• Avoiding people, activities, or places associated with eating and drinking
• Avoiding going to the beach or pool because you will need to wear a bathing suit
• Avoiding shopping for a bathing suit that fits you because those fitting rooms can show how fat you are from all angles and on top of that the fluorescent lights show every blemish and wrinkle

Although I have overcome my fear of the scale, having lost 50 pounds and maintaining this weight for4 years it is a constant battle.

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